“EMT and aspiring nurse Breonna Taylor, 26, was shot to death by police in her own home on March 13. In what has been described as a ‘botched raid,’ officers barged into Taylor’s apartment in Louisville, Kentucky, as she lay sleeping, and fired multiple rounds.” From The Cut, which goes on to describe layer after layer of missteps, incompetence and corruption in the Louisville Police.

For months, those of us in the Movement for Black lives have been demanding charges for the officers who killed Breonna Taylor. Finally, on September 23^rd, one officer was charged with “wanton endangerment.” Not even manslaughter. According to The Cut:

[Wanton endangerment] is a Class D felony in Kentucky, the least serious class of felonies in the state, carrying a possible sentence of one to five years in prison and maximum fines of $10,000. Once arrested, Hankison will be held on a $15,000 bond.

The wanton-endangerment charges are reportedly not even related to Taylor’s killing but to Hankison’s shooting his gun ten times into neighboring apartments, referred to in the indictment by the occupants’ initials, “C.D.” “T.M.,” and “Z.F.” Taylor’s initials do not appear in the document. Hankison had reportedly fired through a sliding glass door into multiple apartments including Taylor’s.

No.

Wanton Endangerment is not what happened in that apartment that night while Breonna Taylor was sleeping. Wanton endangerement is what happened to Breonna Taylor every other day of her life. James Baldwin said, “To be black and conscious in America is to be in a constant state of rage.” To be Black and female in America is to be in a constant state of wanton endangerment. We are in a perpetual state of unprotection from being assaulted, exploited, abused, gaslighted, ignored, neglected and thrown away. And in areas of sexuality, “wanton” is the exact word that has been weaponized against us.

Wanton

adjective

sexually lawless or unrestrained; loose; lascivious; lewd: wanton behavior.

noun

a wanton or lascivious person, especially a woman.

 

From the beginning, even as the law refused to restrain white property owners or really any white men from sexually assaulting us, we were the ones painted as wanton, as sexually unrestrained. And the law still does not restrain white men, especially police officers from assaulting us (Daniel Holtzclaw). And when the police aren’t committing acts of sexual violence, they are notorious for mistreating victims of sexual violence. Which is why Black women have never been able to rely on police to keep us safe. Which is one of the many reasons why we need to Defund the Police.

We were kidnapped from Africa and trafficked here to have our labor stolen from us: sexual and reproductive and domestic and field labor. All stolen. And although slavery officially ended, the larger world never got the memo. We–Black women–live in a perpetual state of pre-Juneteenth where everyone feels entitled to a piece of us.

How perfect that the Kentucky Attorney General Daniel Cameron is a Black man, because even Black men—as a group—cannot be counted on to value our lives. And as Retired Los Angeles police sergeant Cheryl Dorsey said,  “Let me say this as a black woman. [Cameron] does not speak for black folks. He’s skin-folk, but he is not kinfolk….he is up there with a black face, he does not speak for all of us. This was not a tragedy. This was a murder. He should be ashamed of himself.”

Shame on you, Daniel Cameron, as you stab your mama, your sisters, your aunties in the back in order to kiss the white Republican asses of men like Mitch McConnell and Donald Tr*mp. Partly because of traitorous Black men like you, wanton endangerment is our daily condition as Black women.

Shame, indeed.

 

 

This. Was. Murder.

 

(Apologies to anyone looking for my whiteness poem today. It will be published next week. This news superseded.)